BIOMATERIALS - Key Persons
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- Associate Professor School of Electrical & Computer Engineering
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- Associate Professor
- Associate Professor, School of Public Policy
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- Associate Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Executive Assistant
- Assistant to the Executive
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- Director, Emory Voice Center
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- Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering
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- Assistant Professor of Cell Biology
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- Associate Professor School of Physics
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- Assistant Professor, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
- Research Professional
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- Administrative Operations Coordinator
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Professor
- Professor, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
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- Professor & Rae S. and Frank H. Neely Chair School Mechanical Engineering
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- Executive Director
- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Member of the Faculty Steering Committee
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Executive Director, IBB
- Executive Director, Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience
- Executive Director, Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
- Executive Director, Petit Institute, and Regents' Professor, School of Mechanical Engineering
Andrés J. García is the Parker H. Petit Chair and Executive Director of the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience. He is a Regents' professor in Georgia Tech's Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. García received his Ph.D. and M.S.E. degrees from the University of Pennsylvania. His research centers on integrating engineering and biological principles to control cell function to restore and/or enhance activity in injured or diseased organs. Specific research areas include adhesive force regulation and mechanotransduction, mechanobiology technologies for induced pluripotent stem cells, cell-instructive adhesive materials for regenerative medicine, and biomaterials for imaging and modulating inflammation and infection.
I am honored to serve as the Executive Director of the Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience (IBB) at such an exhilarating time for our bio-community. As of Fall 2023, we have more than 287 interdisciplinary faculty researchers (engineers, scientists, and clinicians) and 1,300 trainees making unprecedented discoveries and generating innovative technologies that will transform health care, drive economic impact, and improve the global human condition.
Also, with approximately 20,000 people attending more than 400 events annually hosted by IBB, I am reminded of three words that perfectly describe our geographic strength: location, location, location. This is obviously the place to be. With our state-of-the-art core facilities, outstanding collaborative culture, and generous seed funding to support projects in the critical early stages, our 19 multidisciplinary research centers, and a thriving entrepreneurial spirit, we are well equipped to "Transform Tomorrow" whether it is the next collaborative discovery, the next educational opportunity, or the next startup company.
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- Media Contact
- Assistant Vice President of Research Communications
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- External Advisory Board Chair
Anjali Kumar, Ph.D., has 20 years of experience with increasing responsibility in the biopharmaceutical industry, and is currently responsible for developing an external early-stage innovation pipeline aligned with the strategies of Johnson & Johnson's businesses, with primary priority given to the pharmaceutical sector. She previously served as the Due Diligence Lead, Corporate Development for Shire Pharmaceuticals, and before that she was the vice president, nonclinical R&D and scientific affairs at Flexion Therapeutics, Inc. She has a strong scientific background and drug discovery and development experience gained in large pharmaceutical and small biotech company environments. She has experience advancing several small molecules and proteins into initial clinical development and continuing to support them through later stages of development and eventual regulatory approval. Kumar has worked in the area of inflammation in musculoskeletal, respiratory, and cardiovascular diseases. She was previously vice president of R&D at Clinquest, Inc. where she led the strategic drug development consulting team that worked on multiple programs in both the U.S. and in Europe. Prior to that, she was senior director, pharmacology at Critical Therapeutics, Inc. and principal scientist and project leader at Wyeth Research/Genetics Institute. She received her postdoctoral training at Pharmacia and Upjohn, Inc. She holds a Ph.D. in bioengineering from Georgia Institute of Technology and a Bachelor's degree in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology.
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- Department of Otolaryngology
Anthony Lee has over 18 years of experience in the medical device business. He is currently the president of Eyegenix LLC, a venture backed start-up developing a biosynthetic cornea for the treatment of corneal blindness. In 2011, Eyegenix and sister company Skai Ventures were awarded the statewide winner of the APEC 2011 Business Innovation Showcase. Prior to Eyegenix, Lee led the research and development team at Coalescent Surgical, Inc., a venture funded medical device startup focused on minimally invasive cardiovascular bypass and valve fixation. Coalescent Surgical was acquired by Medtronic, Inc. in 2004. Prior to his work at Coalescent, Lee led R&D efforts at two venture financed companies: Vivant Medical, which was acquired by Valley Lab/Tyco, and AneuRx, which was acquired by Medtronic Inc. Lee is a registered professional engineer in the state of California. He holds numerous U.S. and international patents with several pending. Lee received his BME and MSME from Georgia Tech in 1993 and 1995, respectively. He currently splits his time between San Francisco, CA and Honolulu, HI.
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- Vice President for the Enterprise Innovation Institute
Bridges leads EI², a statewide, 12-program, 160-member organization and the nation's largest and most comprehensive university-based program of business and industry assistance, technology commercialization, and economic development.
B. David Bridges is the Vice President for the Enterprise Innovation Institute (EI2) at the Georgia Institute of Technology. EI2 is the largest, oldest, and most successful economic development organization at any university in the country. It is home to 11 economic development programs which (1) build and scale startups, (2) grow existing small and medium sized enterprises, including manufacturing firms, and (3) energize ecosystem builders (communities, governments, universities, and non-profits). These programs serve the State of Georgia, with programmatic reach across the Southeast region, the United States, and five continents around the world. Bridges concurrently serves as the Director of the Economic Development Lab (EDL) within the Enterprise Innovation Institute. EDL works with communities in Georgia on projects such as workforce development, fiscal and economic impact analyses, strategic planning, and downtown redevelopment. This lab also works locally and globally conducting innovation policy research and implementing innovation ecosystem building projects with 23 countries around the world.
Since joining the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1994, Bridges has worked in various practice areas serving manufacturing firms, national labs, international governments, and innovation ecosystems. He has been a Principal or Co-Principal Investigator on over $20 million in grants and has authored, co-authored, or significantly contributed to over $40 million in winning proposals. Bridges has won over 100 proposals from U.S. federal agencies, plus universities, governments and non-profits from around the world. He is a Principal Research Faculty member and a frequent lecturer and key note speaker in China, South Africa, and across Latin America on nascent, innovation ecosystem building.
Prior to joining EI2, he was a general management consultant and a brand manager at three consumer package goods companies. Bridges has a Bachelor of Business Administration from Emory University and a Master of Science in Marketing from Georgia State University.
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- Interim Executive Director
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- Research Development Manager
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- Associate Professor School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Cornell University
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- CEO
- Co - Founder
- CEO and Co - Founder of Eos BioInnovation
Brock Reeve is CEO and Co-founder of Eos BioInnovation, an investment company focused on incubating and launching companies in the regenerative medicine field. Prior to Eos, Brock was the Executive Director of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, a research center comprised of the schools of Harvard University and its affiliated hospitals and research institutions. Brock's prior experience was in the commercial sector in both management consulting and operations for technology-based companies, with a focus on life sciences.
Brock was the former CEO of IVIVA Medical where he is now on the Board of Directors. He is a co-founder of Elevian, on the Board of Directors of Thrive Bioscience and also on the Board of Trustees for the Pioneer Charter School of Science in Everett, MA.
Brock received a BA and MPhil from Yale University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Bruce Lavin, M.D. has 25 years of clinical experience and more than 15 years of industry experience, leading medical affairs and clinical development programs and divisions for major pharmaceutical companies in the areas of immunology, virology and anti-infectives. Most recently, Lavin was head of external engagement and policy within the neurology unit of UCB, Inc. Lavin was the vice president and therapeutic head for Bristol-Myers Squibb where he led the U.S. clinical and launch preparations for anti-virals in HIV, HCV, rheumatology, and transplant. Prior to Bristol-Myers Squibb, he held senior medical roles for both Novartis and Sanofi-Aventis in the areas of infectious disease, immunology, transplantation, virology and the central nervous system. Additionally, Lavin has a vast military career, currently serving as a medical doctor for the U.S. Navy Reserve. From 2009-2010, he provided medical care and support in a combat area during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Lavin holds a bachelor's degree from the University of California Irvine and a master's of public health from the University of California, Los Angeles. He received his medical degree from the F. Herbert School of Medicine at Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland.
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- Assistant Professor of Radiology and Imaging Sciences, Emory University
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- Junior Professor School of Civil & Environmental Engineering
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- Executive Vice President
- Executive Vice President for Research
- the
Chaouki T. Abdallah is the Executive Vice President for Research (EVPR) at the Georgia Institute of Technology. As chief research officer, Abdallah provides overall leadership for the Institute's $1.45 billion portfolio of research, economic development, and sponsored activities, including the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), Enterprise Innovation Institute, 10 interdisciplinary research institutes (IRIs), and related research administrative support units. He also serves on the executive committee of the Council on Research for the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities (APLU), the executive committee for the Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable (GUIRR), and the advisory committee for the Center on Measuring University Performance (MUP).
Since Abdallah assumed the role of EVPR, the Institute took occupancy of Coda, a first-of-its-kind, mixed-use facility in the heart of Tech Square, designed to create opportunities in interdisciplinary research, commercialization, and sustainability. Under his leadership, Georgia Tech also recently launched the "Commission on Research Next," a process that will map a comprehensive future for research at Tech. The initiative will also develop the Institute's strategy to bolster commercialization efforts and tech transfer initiatives, and grow critical collaborations with industry, government, the national labs, and foundations.
Chaouki T. Abdallah is the Executive Vice President for Research (EVPR) at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Abdallah serves as chief research officer for the Institute, providing overall leadership for the research, economic development, and related support units within Georgia Tech. As a direct report to President Ángel Cabrera and a member of the president's cabinet, he serves as chief research officer for the Institute. This position provides overall leadership for the $1.45 billion annual research enterprise that includes the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), 10 interdisciplinary research institutes (IRIs), as well as economic development, and related support units within Georgia Tech. He also serves on the executive committee of the Council on Research for the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities (APLU), the executive committee for the Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable (GUIRR), and the advisory committee for the Center on Measuring University Performance (MUP).
Abdallah came to Georgia Tech from the University of New Mexico, where he served as the university's 22nd president, as provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, as well as department chair of the electrical and computer engineering (ECE) department. During his tenure, Abdallah oversaw long-range academic planning and efforts to improve student success, as well as retention-achievement and graduation achievement rates.
He conducts research and teaches courses in the area of systems theory with a focus on control, communications, and computing systems. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, national laboratories, and various companies. Abdallah, who is fluent in English, French, and Arabic, is a senior member of IEEE and a recipient of that organization's Millennium Medal.
Abdallah began his college career at the Faculté d'ingénierie of the Université Saint-Joseph in Lebanon, then obtained a Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.) degree from Youngstown State University in 1981, and a M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Georgia Tech in 1982 and 1988, respectively.
He has published eight books (three as co-editor and five as co-author) and more than 300 peer-reviewed papers and provided expert testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.
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- Provost, Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs / University of Wisconsin - Madison
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- Adjunct Assistant Professor
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- Turnipseed Family Chair and Professor
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- Senior Executive
- Managing Director and Founder / Medtown Ventures
Chris Fair has over 25 years of senior executive management and entrepreneurial experience focused in medical device and biologic platforms. Fair's operational experience covers areas such as strategic market plans, product development, sales, marketing, finance, and the ability to take platform technologies from creation through commercialization in the most efficient pathway possible.
Fair began his medical device career at DePuy, where alongside a small team of personnel, helped to build the spine franchise from a $10M business to a $350M business within a 9 year timeframe. Fair then served as Vice President Sales and Marketing, St. Francis Medical Technologies where he was responsible for the U.S. launch of the XSTOP device. The launch of the XSTOP achieved $43M in U.S. revenue in the first 11 months and resulted in the largest medical device multiple with an acquisition price of $725M to Kyphon. After St. Francis, Fair served as the COO of MedShape Solutions, an innovative shape memory polymer and nitinol company, where he remains an active investor. Fair went on to start Amniox Medical, a spin out company based on amniotic tissue therapies for markets outside of ophthalmology. In the company's first year of operation, Amniox surpassed all revenue targets and achieved profitability. Most recently, Fair served as President and CEO of a private equity backed spine venture, Amendia/Spinal Elements, a $100M + spinal implant company based in Carlsbad, CA.
Fair serves on the boards of Spinal Elements, CellectCell, and 510Kardiac. Fair received his BS Business Administration from the University of Richmond.
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- Executive Director of Technical Operations / Head of Early Stage CMC and Product Launch Programs
Chris Gemmiti, Ph.D., has dedicated his 20+ year career to cell therapy and regenerative medicine, through both industry and academic roles. He is currently the Executive Director of Technical Operations and Head of Early Stage CMC and Product Launch Programs at CRISPR Therapeutics. This includes multiple candidates in the Hemoglobinopathy, Immuno-oncology and Regenerative Medicine franchises. He was most recently the Senior VP of Operations at Sentien, where he has broad operational responsibilities for this clinical-stage MSC company. He held a key role in opening and executing Sentien's IND for COVID-19 patients experiencing multi-organ failure. Gemmiti joined Sentien from Harvard's Wyss Institute, where he guided translation strategy and technical development of early-stage regenerative medicine technologies. Previously, at Organogenesis Inc., he was the business unit Director responsible for the clinical development, FDA approval (2012), and commercial launch of GINTUIT™, the first manufactured allogeneic cell therapy approved by BLA. He holds a Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Georgia Tech, where he was an NSF Fellow in Entrepreneurship, and a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University. Gemmiti has served on Advisory Boards at Georgia Tech, Johns Hopkins, Duke University, TERMIS, Cell Therapy Bioprocessing and Alliance for Regenerative Medicine.
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- Event and Meeting Manager II
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- Professor School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
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- Director of Events & Engagement
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- Executive Assistant
- Program Manager
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- Associate Vice President for Research Administration
Hope oversees sponsored programs operations at Georgia Tech. In addition to functions supporting grants and contracts, these operations administer sponsored research sub-contracting, non-disclosure agreements (and other exchange agreements in support of research), enterprise contracting systems and data, and a training and outreach team.
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- Senior Director Life Sciences and VentureLab Principal
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- Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Senior Research Scientist
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- Building Coordinator I ( BME )
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- Program and Operations Manager
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- Faculty Support Coordinator
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- Professor of Medicine, Medical Oncology and Pathology
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- Professor, Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Research Development Manager
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- Adjunct Associate Professor
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- Cellular Analysis and Cytometry Lab Manager
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- Research Center Start - Up Manager
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- Attorney
- Board Member of the Atlanta Chapter of the ARCS Foundation
- Principal / Pogonip, LLC
Erin Dasher is an attorney and business professional with over 15 years of experience in venture, private equity, M&A, and investment management. Dasher has advised seed and early stage venture funds, entrepreneurs, startups, and emerging growth companies. Dasher served as General Counsel of STW Fixed Income Management for seven years and helped to grow assets under management to over $12 billion. Before leaving the firm, she co-led the sale of STW to Schroders. Prior to STW, Dasher was as an attorney at O'Melveny & Myers and Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, where she led transactions in venture capital, public and private offerings, M&A, joint ventures, and commercial transactions.
Dasher is a board member of the Atlanta chapter of the ARCS Foundation which provides funding to students completing degrees in science, engineering, and medical research. Dasher and her husband Karl are actively involved in the Georgia Tech community and strong supporters of local scientific research and scholarship. Dasher is a graduate of University of California, Santa Cruz and graduated magna cum laude from Cornell Law School.
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
- Vasser Woolley Foundation Chair in Bioanalytical Chemistry
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- Vice President for Research and Sponsored Programs / Clark Atlanta University
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- Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences
- Professor
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- Assistant Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Adjunct Associate Professor
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- Director, Healthcare Innovation Program / Emory University
Fred Sanfilippo, M.D., Ph.D., received his B.A. and MSc in physics from the University of Pennsylvania, and his M.D. and Ph.D. from Duke University, where he also did his residency training and joined the faculty from 1979-1992, rising to professor of Pathology, Immunology, and Experimental Surgery.
From 1993-2000, Sanfilippo was the Baxley Professor and Chair of the Department of Pathology at Johns Hopkins, and led the formation of the Johns Hopkins Comprehensive Transplant Center, for which he was the director of research. In 2000, he joined Ohio State University as CEO of the Medical Center, Senior VP for Health Sciences, and Dean of the College of Medicine and Public Health. With over 280 publications and $20 million in personal research grant support, he has received numerous awards and recognition for his research and leadership in transplantation, pathology, and academic medicine, has served on the editorial board of 13 professional journals, and been elected president of seven academic and professional organizations.
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- Member of the Advisory Board
- Chief Scientific Officer Emeritus / Beckman Coulter, Inc. Emeritus Petit Institute Advisory Board Member
G. Russell (Russ) Bell retired from Beckman Coulter, Inc., in April 2009 having served as senior vice president and chief scientific officer since January 2007. Prior to that, Bell was executive vice president of global businesses, a $3 billion enterprise for Beckman Coulter, Inc.
Throughout his career, Bell spearheaded the development of many diagnostic products in cancer, men's and women's health, and cardiovascular disease. Most notably he led efforts resulting in approval of Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) as the first blood test for early detection of cancer in addition to its use in monitoring.
Bell was president, medical director and owner of Jacksonville Reference Laboratories, Inc., in Jacksonville, Fla., from 1973 to 1978. He joined E.I. Du Pont De Nemours & Co. in 1979 in the Clinical Systems Division. In 1987, he became responsible for all diagnostic systems research and development for the $1B division. He joined Hybritech, Inc., a subsidiary of Eli Lilly and Company in August 1989 as vice president for diagnostics research and development. He was appointed president and CEO in September 1994.
He has chaired the National Advisory Council of the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing at UC Davis since 2010 and served as member of the External Advisory Board of the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience at Georgia Tech from 1996 to 2017. He has served on the board of the Wallace H. Coulter Foundation and was President of the Beckman Coulter Foundation, institutions dedicated to philanthropy in medical and translational research and education. Bell is a former Chairman of the St. Peter's Health Foundation and now serves on the Board of Directors of St. Peter's Health, Helena, Montana. He now serves on the Board of Trustees, the Biomedical Sciences Advisory and Institutional Research boards at Carroll College and as a volunteer tutor in math and science at Smith Elementary School.
Born in Atlanta, Bell earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Biology in 1969 and a Master of Science degree in 1970 from Georgia Tech. He received his doctorate in biochemistry in 1973 from the University of Georgia.
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- Director of Research Operations
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- Member of the Leadership Team
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- Professor and Chair of the Department of Cell Biology
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- Senior Director for Strategic Partnerships
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- Professor School of Music
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- Founding Member / MEPSS LLC
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- Professor School of Materials Science & Engineering
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- Associate Professor School of Mechanical Engineering & School of Biological Sciences
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- Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Associate Dean for Research and Innovation, College of Engineering
Hannah Choi is an Assistant Professor in the School of Mathematics at Georgia Tech. Her research focuses on mathematical approaches to neuroscience, with primary interests in linking structures, dynamics, and computation in data-driven brain networks at multiple scales. Before coming to Georgia Tech, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Washington and also a visiting scientist at the Allen Institute for Brain Science, and spent one semester at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing at the University of California, Berkeley as a Patrick J McGovern Research Fellow. She received her Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Northwestern University and her BA in Applied Mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley.
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- Associate Professor, School of Physics
- Professor
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- Associate Professor School of Electrical & Computer Engineering
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- Senior Vice President, Georgia Institute of Technology and Director, Georgia Tech Research Institute
Hudgens leads more than 2,900 employees conducting more than $830 million in research across a variety of disciplines, including science, engineering, economics, policy and technical expertise to address national security, state, and industry challenges.
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- Professor of the Practice
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- Chief Engineer, Advanced Warfighting Technologies Division
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- Department of Orthopaedics Associate Professor
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- Professor & Distinguished Faculty Fellow Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Professor School of Biological Sciences
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- Professor School of Physics
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- Associate Professor of Sociology
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- Center Manager of the Center for the Study of Systems Biology
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- Principal
- Research Scientist
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- Professor, Emory / Georgia Tech Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Associate Laboratory Director for Mechanical and Thermal Engineering Sciences
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- Research Development Manager
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- Professor, Microbiology, Biochemistry & Immunology
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- Laboratory Technician II
- Laboratory Technician II / Research Professional
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- Interim Associate Director for Community - Engaged Research
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- Director of Academic & Research Facilities Infrastructure
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- Professor
- Vice President for Interdisciplinary Research
Kubanek oversees all interdisciplinary activities including the Interdisciplinary Research Institutes, Interdisciplinary Research Centers, the Pediatric Technology Center, and the Global Center for Medical Innovation.
Julia Kubanek serves as Georgia Tech's Vice President for Interdisciplinary Research and is a professor in the School of Biological Sciences and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry. In this role, she oversees and supports interdisciplinary activities at Georgia Tech including the Interdisciplinary Research Institutes (IRIs); the Pediatric Technology Center (PTC), the Novelis Innovation Hub; the Center for Advanced Brain Imaging (CABI); and the Global Center for Medical Innovation (GCMI). She also partners across the institute on developing and advancing new research initiatives based on student and faculty interests, expertise, and societal need.
Kubanek has held several previous leadership roles at Georgia Tech, including Associate Dean for Research in the College of Sciences and Associate Chair in the School of Biological Sciences. She joined the faculty at Georgia Tech in 2001. Her areas of research interest include chemical signaling among organisms (especially in aquatic systems), natural products chemistry, metabolomics, chemical biology, and drug discovery. She has authored approximately 100 research articles on marine plankton and coral reef chemical ecology, and on the discovery, mechanism of action, and biosynthesis of marine natural products. She was awarded the NSF CAREER Award in 2002, the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) in 2004, and was elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 2012. In 2016, she served as chair of the Gordon Research Conference in Marine Natural Products; since 2016, she has chaired the Scientific Advisory Board of the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology. Kubanek received her B.Sc. in Chemistry from Queen's University, Canada, in 1991 and her Ph.D. in at the University of British Columbia in 1998, and performed postdoctoral research at the University of California - San Diego and the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Associate Professor, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
- Professor School Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
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- Global Chief Product Officer / Honeywell
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- Professor Materials Science & Engineering and School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Executive Chief of Staff for the Office
- Executive Chief of Staff for the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research
Kathleen T. Gosden serves as the executive chief of staff for the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research (EVPR). In the role, she advises the EVPR and the Office of the EVPR on administrative and institutional matters.
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- Associate Professor
- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Bruce and Bridgitt Evans Dean of Engineering at Vanderbilt University
- Milton Endowed Chair, Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Associate Vice President
- Associate Vice President for Research Operations and Infrastructure
Walton oversees the facilitation and support of research across campus and through a variety of principal investigator (PI)-facing activities within the research enterprise, including internally funded research programs. She is responsible for ensuring the effective and strategic support of research and leads in the areas of research space, research computing and data, and research administration and operations.
Krista S. Walton is the Associate Vice President for Research Operations and Infrastructure and Professor and Robert "Bud" Moeller Faculty Fellow in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Georgia Tech.
She received her B.S.E. in chemical engineering from the University of Alabama-Huntsville in 2000 and obtained her Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Vanderbilt University in 2005. Prof. Walton completed an ACS PRF Postdoctoral Fellowship at Northwestern University in 2006. Her research program focuses on the design, synthesis, and characterization of functional porous materials for use in adsorption applications including CO 2 capture, atmospheric water extraction, and air purification. She has raised over $35M in external research funding as PI during her career.
She has published over 130 peer-reviewed articles and presented dozens of plenary lectures, keynotes, and invited seminars. Walton has mentored 25 PhD graduates from her group and currently advises 8 PhD students and 4 senior researchers. Prof. Walton co-founded three spin-off companies from her research over the past decade and currently serves as an Associate Editor for the ACS Journal Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research.
She was the founding Director and Lead PI of Georgia Tech's DOE Energy Frontier Research Center, UNCAGE-ME. She is currently serving as a member of the 2022-2024 cohort of DARPA's prestigious Defense Science Study Group. Prof. Walton's accomplishments have been recognized by many national and international awards including the Department of Energy Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award for Atomic, Molecular, and Chemical Sciences (2020), the AIChE FRI/John G. Kunesh Award for Excellence in Separations Research (2016), the inaugural International Adsorption Society Award for Excellence in Publications by a Young Member of the Society (2013), and the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (2007).
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- Senior Administrative Professional
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- Department of Medicine / Infectious
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- Academic Program Manager I, Bioengineering Program
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- Chief Engineer, Pediatric Technologies, GTRI
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- Professor, McCamish Foundation Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Engineering
Linda G. Griffith, Ph.D., is the School of Engineering Teaching Innovation Professor of Biological and Mechanical Engineering and MacVicar Fellow at MIT, where she directs the Center for Gynepathology Research and the DARPA/NIH-funded Human Physiome on a Chip Program. Griffith received a bachelor's degree from Georgia Tech and a Ph.D. degree from the University of California at Berkeley, both in chemical engineering. Griffith's research is in the field of regenerative medicine and tissue engineering. Her laboratory, in collaboration with J. Upton and C. Vacanti, was the first to combine a degradable scaffold with donor cells to create tissue-engineered cartilage in the shape of a human ear. The 3D printing process she co-invented for creation of complex scaffolds is used for manufacture of FDA-approved scaffolds for bone regeneration. She is also a pioneer in devising ways to control nano-scale stimulation of cells by molecular cues, and in creation of 3D tissue models for drug development. Her work has been featured on television documentary shows including Scientific American Frontiers. She is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, and the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, the Popular Science Brilliant 10 Award, NSF Presidential Young Investigator Award, the MIT Class of 1960 Teaching Innovation Award, Radcliffe Fellow, and several awards from professional societies. She has served as a member of the advisory councils for the National Institute for Dental and Craniofacial Research and the National Institute of Arthritis, Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases at NIH. As chair of the undergraduate curriculum committee for biological engineering at MIT, she led development of the new Biological Engineering SB degree program, which was approved in 2005 as MIT's first new undergraduate major in 39 years.
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- Senior Research Scientist
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- Executive Assistant
- Program Manager
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- Academic Program Coordinator, Bioinformatics and Quantitative Biosciences Graduate Programs
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- Asst. Director for Administrative Operations
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Professor
- Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
- Research Professional
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- Chief Product Officer / Omniome, Inc.
Richard Shen, Ph.D. is the Chief Product Officer of Omniome where he leads the Engineering, Scientific Operations and Collaborations groups. He is responsible for directing the product development teams to innovate and create one of the most accurate Next-Generation Sequencing platforms. Richard is active in the investment community as part of Tech Coast Angels in San Diego and is managing director of RS Technology Ventures, LLC. He is also on the Board of Directors of several public and private companies in the liquid biopsy and therapeutic markets.
Previously, Richard held many senior positions in his 15-year career at Illumina. He has been responsible for Operations, Consumables Product Development and Oncology R&D. As Vice President of Oncology R&D, he led the teams that developed applications for the analysis of tumor genomes. He also guided the team that created the initial processes for the startup GRAIL, Inc. a company focused on detecting early-stage cancer from blood samples.
Richard holds several key patents in the fields of nucleic acid analysis and sequencing. One of his patents enabled the development of a process to sequence the human genome for less than $1,000.
Richard is an alumnus of UCLA (B.S.) and LSU Medical Center (Ph.D.). He did postdoctoral fellowships at University of Michigan Medical Center to study gene therapy and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories to study variation in DNA repair genes.
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Chairman and Professor
- Chairman and Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
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- Associate Vice President of Corporate Engagement
Nolan leads the office that serves as the nexus for the Institute's entire partner relationship and activity portfolios to strategically shape corporate engagement at Georgia Tech for maximum impact. The office is also tasked with facilitating collaboration efforts across various partner units within Tech.
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- Professor School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
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- Executive Director Research Computing and Data
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- Associate Professor
- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences
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- Professor of BME, ECE, and CSE
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- Administrative Professional Senior
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- Principal
- Research Scientist
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- Interim Executive Director
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- Adjunct Assistant Professor
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- Assistant Director of the Petit Institute
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- Associate Professor School of Biological Sciences
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- Chairman & Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Marcus Professor of Cystic Fibrosis
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Member of the Faculty Steering Committee
- Associate Director, Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering & Bioscience / Director, NSF Center for Chemical Evolution
- Associate Director, Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience
- Associate Director, Petit Institute, and Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
- Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Nicholas Hud was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He received his B.S. degree in physics from Loyola Marymount University. His Ph.D. was conferred by the University of California, Davis for physical investigations of DNA condensation by protamine. From 1992-1995 he was a postdoctoral fellow in the biology and biotechnology research program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory with Rod Balhorn. From 1995-1998 he was an NIH postdoctoral fellow in the Molecular Biology Institute at UCLA where he worked with Juli Feigon and Frank A. L. Anet on the application of NMR spectroscopy to the study of DNA-cation interactions. Hud joined the faculty at Georgia Tech as an assistant professor in 1999 and was promoted to full professor in 2008. He has been visiting professor of chemistry at the National NMR Center in Slovenia, and at Imperial College London. Hud currently serves as PI of the NSF Center for Chemical Evolution, as chair of the biochemistry division of the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, as co-director of the Georgia Tech-Emory University Center for Fundamental and Applied Molecular Evolution (FAME), and as associate director of the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience.
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- Professor School of Electrical & Computer Engineering
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- Member of the Advisory Board
- Vice President of Technology Policy and Academic Relations Emeritus / Medtronic, Inc. Emeritus Petit Institute Advisory Board Member
Paul Citron retired in 2003 from Medtronic, Inc., a pioneer in the medical device industry and the largest developer of implantable therapeutic devices. He was Vice President of Technology Policy and Academic Relations. Previously he was Medtronic's Vice President of Science and Technology for over 15 years, responsible for corporate-wide assessment and coordination of technology initiatives and for prioritization and funding of corporate research. These executive positions followed a progression of R&D assignments over his 32-year career at Medtronic where he developed and helped bring to the bedside technologies that advanced the utility, safety, and effectiveness of innovative implanted medical devices. He has authored numerous medical technology peer reviewed publications and has been an invited speaker at biomedical engineering conferences, workshops, symposia, and university classrooms. Citron holds nine U.S. medical device patents, including one that was designated "Patent of Distinction" by Medtronic for its positive impact on patient wellbeing. It permitted for the first-time reliable long-term cardiac stimulation without the need for an open-chest surgical procedure. Consequently, this innovation rapidly became the "treatment of choice" in the medical community. It sharply reduced the incidence of interruption of pacemaker stimulation because of electrode dislodgement and the need for urgent reoperation to restore effective stimulation. Market growth for pacemakers was accelerated because implantation could be performed on an out-patient basis and made it possible for frail patients to receive pacemaker therapy. Every pacemaker company adopted this innovation and it continues to be sold 40 years after it first entered the market.
Citron has a B.S.E.E (1969) from Drexel University and an M.S.E.E. (1972) from the University of Minnesota. In 2013 he received an honorary Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from Drexel University. He was elected a Founding Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) in 1993 and in 2018 was chosen as president-elect of its College of Fellows. Citron was elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) in 2003 where he has served on its Peer Committee, Committee on Membership, and the Draper Prize Committee as its Chair in 2012. He served two terms as an NAE Councilor and was a member of the National Academies' Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy. He served on three National Academy of Medicine consensus studies: Safe Medical Devices for Children (2005); Rare Diseases and Orphan Products: Accelerating Research and Development (2011); and, Identifying and Prioritizing New Preventive Vaccines for Development: Phase I, II, and III. In 2015 he was appointed to the Academy of Medicine's Health and Medicine Division advisory committee. Citron has taught a graduate course on corporate entrepreneurship at Georgia Tech and the University of California San Diego as well as invited lectures to undergraduate bioengineering students at UCSD. He is an advisor to start-up firms in the medical device and biotechnology sector. He is also a member of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies (La Jolla, CA) Leadership Institute, an external advisory body. He currently serves on the UC San Diego Health Board of Advisors as well as the UCSD Bioengineering Board of Trustees.
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- Professor Materials Science & Engineering and School of Chemistry & Biochemistry
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- Executive
- Emeritus Petit Institute Advisory Board Member
Pete Petit is a successful entrepreneurial executive who has also managed several public companies as chairman and CEO. Therefore, his experience and perspectives are brought to the Petit Group's investments.
Petit joined the MiMedx Group, Inc. as chairman of the board of directors, chief executive officer and president in February 2009. From May 2008 until he joined the company, Petit was the president of The Petit Group, LLC, a private investment company. Prior to that, Petit was the chairman and CEO of Matria Healthcare, Inc.
Matria Healthcare was a former subsidiary of Healthdyne, Inc., which Petit founded in 1971. Petit served as chairman and CEO of Healthdyne and some of its publicly traded subsidiaries after Healthdyne became a publicly traded company in 1981. Petit received his bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and master of science degree in engineering mechanics from Georgia Tech, and an MBA degree in finance from Georgia State University. At Georgia Tech, Petit funded a professorial chair for "Engineering in Medicine," endowed the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience, and assisted with the funding of the Biotechnology Building which bears his name. At Georgia State University, he assisted with the funding of the Science Center building which also bears his name. In 1994, he was inducted into the Technology Hall of Fame of Georgia. In 2007, he was inducted into the Georgia State Business Hall of Fame. Petit has previously served as a member of the board of directors of the Georgia Research Alliance, which is chartered by the state of Georgia to promote high technology and scientific development in the state.
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- Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Professor of Chemistry and Biomedical Engineering
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Professor
- Professor, Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Associate Chair for Faculty Development
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- Head Technologist and Fellow / Mubadala Capital Ventures
Raghupathy Sivakumar Vice President of Commercialization Sivakumar leads the newly established Office of Commercialization, which includes the Office of Technology Licensing and VentureLab, that serves as the central engine that drives commercialization and entrepreneurship efforts across Georgia Tech. Profile & Contact Information
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- Academic and Research IT Support Engineer
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- Senior IT Support Professional
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- Associate Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
- Professor
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- Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, Emory University
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- Professor
- Professor, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
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- Associate Professor of Medicine
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- Director of Research Development
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- Senior Director, Research Program Administration
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- Chief Research Operations Officer
- Georgia Tech As the Chief Research Operations Officer
- Vice - President for Finance
- Vice President for Research Operations
Robert Butera serves Georgia Tech as the Chief Research Operations Officer (CROO). He facilitates the Institute's research activities and oversees Research Integrity Assurance, Research Administration, Research Operations/Infrastructure, and Research Development as part of the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research. Butera is a Professor jointly appointed in the Wallace H. Coulter Dept. of Biomedical Engineering and the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Prior to taking on the role of CROO, Butera served as the Vice President for Research Development and Operations (2019-2023). Prior to joining the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research, Butera served as the Associate Dean for Research in the College of Engineering (2016-2019). He previously directed the Neural Engineering Center (2014-2016), served as founding Faculty Director of the Grand Challenges Living Learning Community (2012-2015), and Director of the Interdisciplinary Bioengineering Graduate Program (2005-2008). During the 2008-2009 academic year he served as a Jefferson Science Fellow at the US Department of State in Washington, DC.
Butera received his BEE degree from Georgia Tech (1991) and his MS (1994) and PhD (1996) from Rice University. Following graduate school, he conducted postdoctoral research (1996-1999) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. He joined the faculty of Georgia Tech in 1999.
Butera's research is focused on developing novel methods for peripheral and autonomic nerve modulation using electrical signaling, combining engineering and neuroscience to tackle clinically motivated problems. For much of his earlier career, he conducted research in computational approaches to problems in systems and cellular neuroscience.
Professionally, Butera has served as Vice-President for Finance (2011-2014) and Vice-President for Publications (2017-2019) for the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society as well as on its AdCom (Board of Directors) from 2005-2010. He also served on the Board of Directors for the Organization for Computational Neuroscience (2013-2015). Butera is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Butera facilitates and directs the Institute's research activities and oversees Research Integrity Assurance, Research Administration, and Research Development and Operations as part of the Office of the Executive Vice President for Research.
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- MBNA Bowman Chair & Professor
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- Vice President and Robert and Leona DeArmond Executive Director
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- Director, Climate Change Security
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- Adjunct Associate Professor, Biological Sciences
- Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences
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- Assistant to the Executive Director
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- Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering
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- Managing Partner / the Salutramed Group, Inc.
Russell M. Medford, M.D., Ph.D. has served, since April 1, 2009, as chairman and president of Salutria Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company. From 1995 to April 1, 2009, Medford served as president, chief executive officer and director of AtheroGenics, Inc., a publicly-held pharmaceutical company.
Medford serves on the Biotechnology Industry Organization Board of Directors and BIO Emerging Companies Section Governing Body, and he served as Chairman of the Georgia BioMedical Partnership from 2004 to 2007 and the Georgia Biotechnology Industry Organization Board of Directors. Medford was an associate professor of medicine and director of molecular cardiology at the Emory University School of Medicine, and currently holds the appointment of adjunct clinical professor of medicine. Medford received a B.A. from Cornell University, and a M.D. with Distinction and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
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- Director, EVPR Administration
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- Professor and Patsy and Alan Dorris Chair in Pediatric Technology
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- Executive Director
- Executive Director of the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines, Professor and KUKA Chair for Robotics
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- Professor School of Materials Science & Engineering
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- BME Graduate Program Coordinator
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- Faculty Support Coordinator
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- Senior Research Scientist
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- Associate Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
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- Assistant Professor Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Professor Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Dunn Family Associate Professor Physics & Biological Sciences
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- Member of the Core Facilities Advisory Committee
- Assistant Director, Core Facilities
- Senior Assistant Director, Core Facilities
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- Research Administration Manager, Senior
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- Director of Business Development
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- Associate Professor, Departments of Neurology and Biomedical Engineering ( Adjunct )
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- Associate Vice President for Research Integrity Assurance
Myles leads the Office of Research Integrity Assurance, which includes the Human Research Protection Program (HRPP), Institutional Animal Care & Use (IACUC), Dual Use Research of Concern (DURC), Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC), Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR), and the Animal Care Program. She also serves as the Research Integrity Officer (RIO).
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- Faculty Support Coordinator
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- Vice President for Research & Innovation / University of California
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- Georgia State Representative
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- Associate Professor, School of Mechanical Engineering
- Professor, School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Founder and President / Encendia Inc.
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- Associate Professor, School of Materials Science and Engineering
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- Assistant Professor, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
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- Senior Director / Search and Evaluation / Takeda
For over 30 years, Dr. Ling led successful research and business innovation groups in diverse biotechnology fields, including cell devices, protein engineering, biosimilars, stem cell differentiation, checkpoint inhibitors and molecular evolution of antibody scaffolds. He has held leadership positions in large, midsized and start-up environments, creating practical biotherapeutics. His current interests lie in novel drug delivery technologies, which includes drug particles, energy guidance and biomaterial scaffolds. Dr. Ling currently serves as Senior Director within Search and Evaluation, Business Development at Takeda, after directorship roles in external innovation and pharmaceutical sciences. Prior to Takeda, Dr. Ling was Head of Biological Sciences developing cell therapies for wet AMD at Neurotech. He has held positions including Vice President at Dragonfly Sciences, managing all scientific operations and marketing functions, Director of Molecular Genetics at Adnexus (Compound Therapeutics), and other scientific roles in Discovery Research at Genetics Institute and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Ling earned a BA in Molecular Biology at University of California, Berkeley, followed by MS and Ph.D at University of Illinois, and postdoctoral training at the Harvard Biological Laboratories.
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- Associate Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Professor of Medicine ( Emory ) and Biomedical Engineering ( GT / Emory )
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- Department of Biomedical
- Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Engineering
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- Adjunct Associate Professor
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- Department of Biomedical
- Professor Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
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- Assistant Professor of Surgery, Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery
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- Associate Professor School of Mechanical Engineering
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- Assistant Professor Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech & Emory
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- Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering and Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
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- Associate Professor Division of Physical Therapy, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine